Swami Vigyananand, the Joint General Secretary of the hardline Vishwa Hindu Parishad, on Saturday told a room full of people that the word 'industry' was actually derived from Indus, a river that originates near Mansarovar and flows through the Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir.

Vigyananand was addressing a summit in Bengaluru by the World Hindu Economic Forum (WHEF), when he made the comment that Times of India reported. It created a flurry of outrage on social media sites over the weekend. Vigyananand had more to say about the issue.

"I am telling you the 'industry' word has come from us - Indus. We were very industrialized, (and) that is why they used the word," Vigyananand said. He said the British coined the term when they saw how industrialized India was before the plunder by its invaders.

Now, the actual word possibly has its etymology in old French 'industrie', Latin 'industria' and from early Latin 'indostruus', but Twitter users have jokingly carried forward the torch that Vigyananand has lit, 'discovering' Indian roots in a host of everyday English words.

The term "Indus' is an Anglicized version of Sindhu. The government should replace the word Industry with Sindhustry https://t.co/vvrRxdHCA3